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TI vs. Calculator Hobbyists, the Next Round
An anonymous reader writes "Texas Instruments has struck back against Nspire gamers and hackers with even stronger anti-downgrade protection in OS 3.0.2, after the TI calculator hacking community broke the anti-downgrade protection found in OS 2.1 last summer and the new one in OS 3.0.1 a month ago. In addition to that, in OS 3.0.1 the hacker community found Lua programming support and created games and software using it. Immediately, TI retaliated by adding an encryption check to make sure those third-party generated programs won't run on OS 3.0.2." But if you want it, you can get OS 3.0.2 here.
I believe it's related to them being certified tamperproof.. allowed in exams.. academia, their main customers etc etc
I remember when the community broke the TI-92. What did TI do then? Release an upgraded version of it and made it easier ton write in assembly. What happened, TI? I no longer need your calculator products, but this is a sad thing to see.
I run Ubuntu skinned to look like a Mac on a PC. Go figure.
*everyone* is trying to copy the iPhone these days
OK, so then perform an integrity check at boot. If the checksums don't match, display a message for 10 seconds. Invigilators can then confirm that the examinee has a clean device.
char*f="char*f=%c%s%c;main(){printf(f,34,f,34);}";main(){printf(f,34,f,34);}
The HP series of graphing calculators allow hacking and programming.
On the 50g, you can write in RPL, Saturn Assembly, C and ARM Assembly. It uses an ARM processor to emulate the Saturn processor that came in the 48.
While the 50g is not as nice physically as the 48gx in terms of keyboard, it's miles ahead of the 49. Stay away from the 49 and the 48gII.
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BMO
As a non-programmer, which the test creators and proctors likely are as well, here is my train of thought:
1) Cool. Good solution.
2) Wait, that means we have to check every calculator.
3) There were ~100 students taking the SAT/ACT tests when I took them. About 20-30 students in my low level math courses in college. Decent time sink to have each student turn on the calculator, wait for the checksum, verify it, move to the next student. Waiting for students to turn off their calculators because there will always be some who jump the gun.
I had a TI, I loved the customization some could pull off. I just can't blame TI for wanting to perfect their device for their marketing niche. Still, couldn't TI just make a "Academia Certified" version with extra protection and their normal model for those who don't need it?
by Anonymous Coward: I, for one, welcome the shift from car analogies to pizza analogies. um.. overlords?
Why would I want to buy a product from a company that so hates it's customers?
Two reasons: 1. If you don't buy one you can't do the homework and quizzes and thus fail the class. 2. If you pull out an Android device during downtime in class (even in flight mode) it gets confiscated by faculty, but if you pull out a TI product you're fine.
You have to check EVERY Calculator already to look for firmware revision. So how is this a problem? It's not like the older version added wrong, so running a older firmware will give me advantages that lazy test administrators will not bother to look at.
OH how about simply supplying the calculators for the test? Sounds like a better solution that all these highly educated nimrods cant seem to think of on their own.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
In high-school I wrote an arbitrary problem approximating algorithm for the TI-82 in its horribly broken calculator basic. Also, we wrote applications to play solitare, reversi, tetris, and a really crappy overhead shooter without resorting to assembly.
If you have ANY ability to program your calculator exposed, you have zero test integrity. Anything less than that is delusional. Whether that's Ti-Calculator Basic or a more modern programming language doesn't really matter.
As another example, the TI-92 I had in College was banned from the SAT's for having a QWERTY keyboard, yet the TI-89's shared the same internals without a keyboard and were OK. The difference? You had to press the "Function" key to type with a QWERTY equivalent. It's security theater.
The ______ Agenda
I just bought a pork joint, now the instructions on the packaging are very clear on how to roast the thing but I was going to dry rub it and then smoke it for a few hours. Does anyone know if pork comes with DRM to stop me doing that or will I get a DMCA takedown notice halfway through smoking?
Because their main customers are academic test producers who mandate TI calculators for use with the scan tron tests because they're less "hackable". This causes every student in high school to be forced to go out and buy one for use on the exams.
The enthusiast crowd isn't even a rounding error in that market, so it makes sense for TI not to care about them.
I am disappointed with TI. My first programming language was TI-BASIC on the TI-83 Plus. My second was assembly for the Z80 processor on that calculator. Both were supported by TI (the program used to transfer assembly programs from a computer to the calculator was produced and distributed by TI). It is the reason I chose to pursue computer science in college, and has made me the happy programmer I am today. It is sad TI does not want to allow today's youth the same opportunity through the same means.
And why should anyone trust that message? Can you be sure it was generated by the trusted firmware?
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Gamers, hackers and cheaters aren't their target customers. Schools are. TI loves schools. Hence it does everything to please them. Such as preventing tampering.
Why are we teaching children to do jobs that can be done by computers? Computers are terrible and math and really good at calculation -- why don't we divide the effort (and hence the instruction) along those lines.
I'm not saying we shouldn't teach children to do arithmetic, but there's a limited amount of math instruction time available, and I don't think we should waste it being sure Johnny can manually calculate large bits of long division instead of teaching him what division might actually accomplish.
If you want to be sure Johnny understands the calculation, have him write a program for his calculator that does it. Once he can do that he clearly understands the manipulation required so there's no reason to make him keep doing manually it when there's a $0.03 device that can do the same thing faster and more accurately.
To me this all seems equivalent to teaching kids to farm using ox-powered plows rather than tractors -- yes, it's important to understand how it works, but it's not important to be able to actually do it efficiently once you've got that understanding.
Because it strengthens the part of the brain that does symbol manipulation. Learning to do long division quickly and accurately sets up the brain so it can do more complex algorithm's involving variables quickly and accurately.
Great plan, except you are one generation away from having no one capable of creating new algorithms for computers. If one cannot do it, one cannot tell the computer how to do it.
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